Kinew hints at funding in budget to get once-lauded St. Boniface Hospital cardiac program beating strongly again

Premier Wab Kinew hinted Friday that next month’s provincial budget will revive St. Boniface Hospital’s “gutted” cardiac-care program.

“We’re going to make sure in the future (that) St. B, which functions as our heart hospital in Manitoba, is going to have the resources it needs to take care of people,” Kinew said Friday.

The government will table the budget on March 24. Kinew didn’t provide any funding details Friday.

On the campaign trail in September 2023, he said if elected, Manitoba’s New Democrats would spend $5 million annually to fund positions at Cardiac Sciences Manitoba at St. Boniface Hospital.

Nearly a decade ago, St. Boniface was lauded as one of the best places for cardiac care in Canada. A 2017 Canadian Institute for Health Information report found the Manitoba program had below-average rates of patient mortality and readmission after surgery.

Kinew said the previous Progressive Conservative government’s austerity measures “completely gutted” the cardiac program.

His comments Friday came just weeks after the death of Stacey Ross, a 55-year-old woman who went to St. Boniface Hospital in January, believing she was having a heart attack. She died after being admitted to a room that became available following an 11-hour wait in the emergency ward.

Preliminary investigation findings showed she had a heart attack while waiting and that her death was preventable, her family has said.

A critical incident review is ongoing. The cause of death is still undetermined.

The hospital’s cardiac medicine program built up over a decade beginning in the mid-2000s and grew into a multi-disciplinary team staffed with specialized doctors, nurses and allied health-care staff.

Dr. Alan Menkis headed the cardiac team as its medical director from 2004 until he retired in 2016. He teaches cardiac surgery once a month at the hospital.

Former premier Brian Pallister’s health system restructuring and COVID-19 pandemic impacts largely dismantled the program in the years after 2016, Menkis said.

While there is a cardiac program with a medical director in place, it has become “increasingly difficult” to provide the care once offered, he said.

Menkis believes a shift in governance is needed for health authorities to be held accountable. The cardiac program should be provincial, similar to CancerCare Manitoba, he said, adding resources — bed space — must be protected for patients.

“We can’t allow people with straightforward heart attacks — who could survive very easily — to not get access to the tertiary care they need because the hospital is busy,” he said.

The Winnipeg Regional Health Authority was unable to provide staffing and bed numbers data for 2026 and 2016 by end of day Friday.

Kinew said $22 million is needed to repair the damage. In 2023, he pointed to a “centre of excellence” with improved surgical access and wait times, and a focus on prevention and recovery from heart disease, among other things.

The Progressive Conservatives didn’t accommodate an interview request Friday.

“I’m really mad… I keep replaying it,” said Stacey Ross’s sister Sheri Ross.

“My sister went in there and said to the (emergency room) intake person she thinks she’s having a heart attack, and they told her to sit down. If St. Boniface is supposed to be where you go for a heart attack, then they’re not doing what they’re supposed to be doing.”

Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara met with Sheri Ross following the family’s calls for a public inquiry into her sister’s death. The province is hiring an out-of-province expert to investigate the case. The family plans to share the results.

“We want this to go as public as possible,” she said. “Somebody made a mistake somewhere, and I want somebody to be held accountable.”

There’s a provincewide shortage of cardiology technologists, who run diagnostic tests on emergency-room patients who may be experiencing heart attacks, said the president of Manitoba Allied Health Care Professionals.

“The province should make the investments in cardiac care that they promised, and make sure those investments are focused on retaining the specialized allied health professionals… needed when Manitobans go to the emergency room,” Jason Linklater wrote in a statement.

Targeted incentives are essential to keep employees around, he added.

A spokesperson for physician advocacy organization Doctors Manitoba said a modern, state-of-the-art program is key to recruiting and retaining cardiac surgeons and cardiologists.

“There’s no question that we need to see significant investments into cardiac care in our province,” they wrote in a statement.

gabrielle.piche@winnipegfreepress.com